About the Budget Travel Table

This table aims to give you an indication of backpacking costs in different countries around the world and help you decide on a suitable backpacking budget. Before trotting off to some distant part of our planet, unless you’re lucky enough to be super rich, you’ll almost certainly have a figure in mind of how much you are going to spend. However it can be hard to predict how much you will spend in countries you’ve never visited and know little about. If it’s your first time backpacking then it can be almost impossible to know how much money you will need. This page will hopefully help you make at least an educated estimate!

The Budget Travel Table suggests a daily shoestring travel budget for backpackers in countries all around the world. It is based on staying in a cheap room or dorm in a budget hostel. It takes into account typical transport costs within a country. It is based on eating local street food, in budget restaurants or self-catering and averaging a few alcoholic drinks every night in a non too swanky bar. It includes the cost of some cheap typical daytime activities such as visits to museums but expensive activities such as safaris or thrill-seeking sports are optional extras and not included in the calculations.

If it’s your first time travelling, you might be wise to allow for a little more than the figures quoted. All of the budgets are realistic but will require some self-discipline to stick too.

IMPORTANT – We will be updating this page soon with estimated daily backpacking costs for 2018 in all these countries and perhaps a few more. Please use the comments section at the bottom or contact us and share your travel costs in countries you’ve visited. It really helps to keep this table up-to-date and as accurate as possible which isn’t easy.

World Budget Travel Table

Backpacking Costs in Different Countries

Dirt Cheap Destinations!

These are the world superpowers of budget travel. It is possible and often fairly easy to get by on as little as $15 in some of them provided you are prepared to rough it a little bit and resist the tempting tourist buses, restaurants and hotels and stick to hostels, local transport and local restaurants.

In some of these countries just US$2-3 can get you a bed for the night, transport you 200km or buy a round at the bar. Destinations like Sihanoukville, Cambodia (pictured above) let you experience paradise on a tiny budget and although prices are slowly rising in one or two of these countries, it’s not hard to find fantastic value.

Travelling just in these countries you can budget around $140 a week. A whole year of travel on this sort of budget can set you back as little as $7000 or £6000, however you should allow in a little more for flights, visas, travel insurance etc as costs for these things depend on where you are from so are impossible to factor into this table.

More Great Places for Shoestring Travellers

Some fascinating countries in this lot and still remarkably cheap travelling. $200 a week should certainly cover it and a year in these sort of countries should work out at under $10,000 or around £7500. North African countries like Morocco (pictured above) and Egypt are great value and intriguing places to visit but there is a real mix of destinations in there.

Worth noting we’ve moved Thailand up from $20 due to numerous requests to do so. If you’re not big into the party culture in Thailand you can still easily get by on $20 or less but it’s probably fair to say that most people end up spending more than $25 in Thailand due to the drinking/party element.

As for Kenya we have changed that down to $25 because it is starting to make itself more appealing to budget travellers rather than those merely on luxury safari holidays. You can probably get by on less in truth but entrance to the expensive national parks and definitely safaris can still blow your budget so it really depends on what kind of trip you want to have.

In this lot you see the cheaper European countries creeping into the table as well as several African nations. While you may assume that Eastern Europe and Africa are cheap regions to visit, that isn’t completely the full story as you will find out further down although certainly the countries featured here including China still represent great value for the traveller.

Budget Travel Destinations (but only by Western Standards)

If you’re from an expensive country yourself, you’ll still find these places very cheap and prices are around almost half what they are in Western Europe or the USA and Canada. Although there are no South American countries in this section, $35/day may still be a reasonable guide to an overall trip in South America.

An average trip in Eastern Europe or the more expensive countries in East Africa might also fall into this range. 6 months of travel in these countries would set you back less than $7,000 and slightly over £5,000.

Russia, was the biggest mover in the 2016 table due to the rapid depreciation in its currency over the past two years. As recently as August 2014, you could get just 35 Roubles for US$1. That figure had soared to around 70 Roubles as of May 2016 before steadying down to 60 as of January 2017 but it has still made travelling in the country considerably cheaper than it was only a couple of years ago, although in large countries like Russia there is often considerable regional variation in costs.

Hong Kong also makes this section and although it has a reputation as an expensive place, the fact you spend very little on travelling around (as it is so small) and can still get cheap beds in hostels on Hong Kong island or Kowloon makes it good value. South Korea is also a lot cheaper than many people realise. Get some tips on budget travel in Korea here!

around US$40 per day | €38 per day | £33 per day

Mozambique

Uruguay

Lebanon

Jamaica

Mozambique is a good example of an African country that can be quite pricey to travel in, likewise Uruguay in South America. You can go well over $40 in both countries if you’re not a bit disciplined as much of the travel industry in both countries isn’t particularly geared towards backpackers.

Mid-Range

A real cross-section of countries from different regions are sitting comfortably in mid-table. Portugal (Lisbon pictured above is Western Europe’s cheapest capital) is still good value when compared to nearby countries while Argentina and Chile are expensive South American countries. You’re looking at $300-350 a week here and in 6 months perhaps $8,000 or £6,500. Some of these countries are already almost 3 times as expensive as the dirt cheap destinations and we are only half way down the table.

Singapore and the Maldives both have expensive reputations but have just enough of a budget travel scene that you can get by on this kind of budget although eating and drinking out in Singapore will see your expenses soar and it would be higher than $45 were it not a city-state where clearly your transport costs will be less than in countries where you have to move from town to town.

Check out our backpacking route in Brazil if you fancy taking on South America’s most expensive destination. Puerto Rico was a new inclusion in the 2016 table and prices aren’t dissimilar to those on mainland USA, which is further down the table due to the cost of covering large distances to get between destinations.

Things are getting Expensive

If you arrive from South East Asia or Central America into Europe then you’re in for a nasty shock. Backpacking bargains will seem like a distant memory almost as quickly as your trusty savings will diminish. 3 months travel in one of the countries in this section would amount to over $5000 (roughly £3500), not far off what a whole year in some of the cheapest countries in our table might cost.

Germany (Berlin Wall pictured above) still represents pretty good value as far as developed European countries go but if you’ve come from the East of the continent’s former divide then it will still seem expensive. Britain is also better value for visitors now, thanks to Brexit so we’ve moved it further up the page for our 2017 budget travel table (it used to be in the section below).

Costs in Canada vary wildly depending on how much travelling around you do. Stay in one place and you could get by on less than $60 per day but if you are trying to see both Eastern and Western Canada in one trip you should budget much more than this unless you are planning on spending several months in the country.

Things are definitely getting Expensive!

These are some of the most expensive countries in the world to travel in. Australia (pictured above), despite its popularity with backpackers, is by no means a budget travel destination. Special deals on coach travel for backpackers helps soften the blow but unless you can get some work or free accommodation in Oz, you will need sizeable savings of over $6,000 or £5,000 if you fancy just three months travelling there or in one of the other countries in this section. Check out our backpacking route for Australia here!

The US Dollar and to a lesser extent the Euro have strengthened against the Scandinavian currencies in recent years, making Sweden and Denmark marginally better value but they are still very much expensive. Meanwhile Iceland is heading in the opposite direction again and having briefly been more affordable, prices are returning to the levels they were at before the economic crash.

USA is much like Canada in that you can probably get by on less than $65 if you stay in one or two states but trying to cover various different parts of the country will push your budget right up.

I’m a Backpacker Get Me Out of here!

If there is ever a TV show called ‘I’m a Backpacker Get me out of here’ it might as well be held in Scandinavia which seems to have a passion for ripping off penny-saving travellers. €8 for a beer. €35 for a bed in a dorm. You cannot be serious! Norway may have the Northern Lights (pictured above) but it sucks to be a budget traveller although not quite as much as it used to given the Krone has lost value against the Dollar and the Euro over the past couple of years too.

That is the reason why in 2016, for the first time in the history of our World Budget Travel Table, Norway was not the most expensive country in the world to travel in (by our estimations at least). That dubious honour instead went to and still goes to Switzerland which may have nice mountains and lakes but is frankly a rip-off.

Allow for at least $2000 a month when visiting these countries. Don’t bother coming for long periods unless you have some serious funds or a job lined up.

How was the table Compiled?

We’ve come up with the figures from our own backpacking experiences and from people who we’ve met along the way and where this hasn’t been possible (we don’t know anyone who has been to Uzbekistan lately) by consulting several sources to come up with hopefully a realistic figure. We also welcome people contacting us to let us know their spending habits in different countries and we have made a few revisions on the back of this. You can do likewise by contacting us or please do use the comments section at the bottom if you spot anything that you believe to be inaccurate or just want to confirm that our figures are roughly in the right ball-park for a country.

Honestly every comment helps but please try to be constructive in your criticism as every person and every travel experience is different so it’s impossible to be 100% accurate on a table like this.

Please remember the figures are based on staying in a budget hostel dorm, travelling by local transport and eating and drinking in local restaurants and street stalls. If you are more flashpacker than backpacker you can expect to spend more than this. If you’ve got a knack for shoestring travel then you may be able to get by on slightly less, particularly in the more expensive countries on our table where couchsurfing, hitch-hiking and camping can really cut down your costs.

Factors to Bear in Mind

Again, this is not an exact science! It is impossible for us or anyone to say how much you will spend on your trip as everyone and every trip is different so please use the table as a guideline and only that!

Prices can vary within countries, for example big or capital cities are often much more expensive as are popular package tourist regions such as Cancun in Mexico for example so bare this in mind when planning your trips. China, Russia, Indonesia and Malaysia are other countries where there are huge regional differences in prices sometimes to the extent where certain regions are twice as expensive as other parts of the same country. This tends to be the case more in bigger countries but not always. Britain for example is considerably cheaper outside of London and the South of England.

Staying in one place for longer or travelling in just a small part of a country will see you get by on less than if you are travelling longer distances and moving on every day or two. In this table we are basing it on moving around once every two or three days.

Also realise that you are going to have to spend quite a bit on your trip before you even leave home on things like flights to/from the region you are heading as well as vaccinations, visas and travel insurance (these are NOT included in the figures here as clearly we don’t know where you are coming from or how much those things might cost you). If you’re looking for insurance geared towards backpacking trips then we strongly suggest checking out World Nomads.

One more thing to think about if you’re on a tight budget is that living in a country is much cheaper than travelling in it and if you can read this page without the help of google translate, chances are you can find work teaching English to fund your adventures. For budget living costs in over 100 cities around the world see our World Budget Living Table. We also have a guide to teaching English abroad if this appeals.

What has Changed?

2016

We last updated this table in early 2015 and have made a few small but significant changes, most of which we’ve pointed out a long the way. Countries that have got cheaper include Russia, Poland, UK, Denmark, Sweden, Norway, Myanmar, Turkey and Malaysia. This is generally due either to the depreciation of currencies in those countries or the strengthening of the Euro, which was at a real low point the last time we compiled the table and therefore some Eurozone members have got slightly more expensive.

We have removed Venezuela from the table due to the ridiculously complicated system where it has several different exchange rates. If you bring in US Dollars or Euros and trade on the black market it’s arguably the cheapest country in the world to visit. Using official tourist exchange places, it’s still a lot cheaper than it was after the official rate was slashed to help cope with severe economic issues but you may still find it as pricey as the most expensive South American destinations like Chile, Argentina and Brazil.

We’ve also taken out UAE as there is still no sign that the oil-rich Gulf state has anything remotely geared towards budget travellers. If anyone has been to Dubai or Abu Dhabi and knows differently, we’d love to hear from you!

4 new countries have been added and they are Jamaica, South Africa, the Maldives and Puerto Rico due to requests from readers. If you’d like a country included in future tables let us know by commenting below or contacting us.

2017

Our 2017 review wasn’t quite as comprehensive as last year but the main factors that have impacted on the table involve Brexit and general economic/political mess in Europe. The Pound has significantly decreased in value over the final 6 months of 2016 and the Euro has also dropped against most currencies except the Pound. As a result visiting Europe and particularly the UK should now be cheaper for non-Europeans and we’ve pushed a few countries up the page as a result of that. Iceland though has really headed in the other direction and is now up there with the most expensive countries again.

It’s also worth bearing in mind that if you are British or from a Euro-country, travelling abroad is likely to cost more in 2017 than it would’ve last year, particularly in countries with currencies linked to the Dollar, which has remained strong in spite of the election of Trump and the uncertainty that brings.

It’s worth keeping an eye on the exchange rates and major events in 2017, as they can have a big impact on how much you are likely to spend on your travels and it will be January 2018 at the earliest, the next time we update this.

And Finally..

If you’ve found this page useful we’d really appreciate it if you share it with your friends/travel buddies. Even better please comment below letting us know your average daily backpacking costs in any countries you’ve recently visited. It helps to keep the table as up-to-date as possible (which can be a challenge as we don’t have eyes in every country) and also helps other travellers plan their trips.

Thanks!

This page was last updated in January 2017.

We will be updating the budget travel table for 2018 soon! Feedback would be great!

Paul Martins

I’m interested in Albania and some other Eastern European countries. What do you know about them? Specifically Albania!? Thanks for your efforts!

Hi Paul. Safe to say Albania is cheap!. Was there last year and it’s as affordable as anywhere in Europe really and a nice country to visit too.
You can get suggested budgets for Albania and other Eastern European countries that aren’t in this table here – http://myfunkytravel.com/europe-backpacking-budget.html

qrovado

this post is AMAZING. so useful and detailed! I love the effort you went to, it’s inspired me to write better blogs. thanks so much for taking the time to write it. it will really help my business partner and I with our start-up http://www.qrovado.com – we specialise in making dirt cheap holiday packages for Americans as we know it’s such a heavy cost burden, but we’ve been having trouble articulating our thoughts into blog posts, so we really appreciate this article. check us out 🙂 Natalie

Jose

Hey guys do you think I can get a job in some of these countries? I wanna travel but I really don’t know if I have enough money to go and I want to work and live in some places for several months

Great list and very helpful. I’d like to chip in my experience on Norway:

Whilst norway is extremely expensive and I was spending as much as £100 / day in oslo, There are a few redeeming features if you do want to travel there on a budget:

*****you can camp pretty much anywhere legally for free******
Seriously folks you can wild camp legally. you could even camp outside oslo and commute in on the tram…
and people are extremely friendly and it is very easy to hitchhike

So while this isn’t going to be ideal for everyone, please have a read below:
If you pick up a tent and a sleeping bag then in the summer months your only expenditure is food. I did two weeks longboarding across the south of the country on £5/day. I Washed in lakes and waterfalls, quite often the rivers and lakes are safe to drink, you can charge your gadgets in gas stations (which are usually unattended), camp and cook in a forest or something and if you really need to get around then either hitch a lift, walk or take public transport which is equivalent in price to the uk but much more reliable. I was paying £2 for ferries around the fjords but as a foot-passenger they quite often didn’t bother to charge me.

So on the one hand it’s the most expensive country I’ve ever been to but on the other hand if you’re happy to get in touch with nature and go wild it can be extremely cheap to explore the fjords. Easily the best time I’ve ever had in my life by the way.

I’m Norwegian and want to comment on this as well. Many tourists come to Norway with the intention of seeing everything – that’s not possible, mostly because of the costs of getting from A to B, and due to the very high prices on accommodation. Despite about only 5 million people living here, Norway is a big country, so focusing on certain areas is also a good idea (also makes it easier to hitchhike). Like Sig said, wildlife camping is legal and this is definitely the best way to experience Norway. Furthermore, planning in advance will take you a long way cost-reduction wise, as you can get domestic flights with Norwegian for about 25-40 £ going anywhere, the same goes with trains if you order in advance. If you avoid the tourist routes on the fjords, and stick to regular ferries or route boats in the fjords, you’ll cut costs a lot. Most cities in Norway have amazing mountains with great views very close to the city center, so spending many hours and a lot of money getting to the most popular mountains (Trolltunga, Kjeragbolten, Preikestolen and so on) is definitely smart to avoid if you want budget travels in Norway (and an authentic experience, as you’ll be more likely to run into locals enjoying their “backyard nature” and less likely to run into massive groups of tourists). If I were a tourist here, I’d avoid buying alcohol in bars, go to smaller and less “commercial” restaurants and only use the transportation that locals do (no tourist busses and so on), and I’m pretty sure it would be possible to live off 25-30 £/ day (not including travel costs getting to and from Norway). Oh, and biking in norway is amazing and buying a bike here is quite cheap, so I’d definitely recomend that if you have more time.

Thanks Katrine for the info. Sounds like really good advice that you and Sig have given.
We try and use a standard formula for working out the budgets for each country to try and be a bit consistent which includes staying in hostels and using public transport to get around which is why Norway is so expensive. However from your comments it sounds as though there are much better ways to see the country on a budget!

hopefully in the next month although there’s only likely to be the odd tweak here and there as it was updated early last year. The exchanged rates have changed a fair bit though so go with the US Dollars and then convert to your own currency for a better idea.

Sawyer Burke

Thanks! This may be a really stupid question, but I am planning on my trip now. Is this at all factoring in average ticket prices or any plane travel into each country (if applicable)? Like for example, I’m going from Indonesia to Vietnam where the average ticket costs $150 USD. Can I assume some of that cost will be assumed in the daily budget for Vietnam in your chart or no?

No, it’s just for your likely average spend when inside each country. Anything like flights in/visa costs etc are extra. It’s difficult to factor that in because people are coming from different places so flight costs vary dramatically. Visa requirements/costs also vary quite a bit depending on nationality.

So certainly somewhere like Vietnam, the costs of getting in and other pre-trip expenses can sometimes be even more than what you’ll actually spend in the country itself if you’re only there for a short time. 🙂

Amelia

I must disagree with you, Harry. My husband and I travelled Thailand last year on $20 Australian per day, each. So it was about $35 USD for the two of us. This included bus tickets, sim cards, decent accommodation, street food and local restaurant food, beers. It definitely can be done but you just need to average it out, if you buy bus tickets one day, the next day you only walk around and see the free tourist attractions. I would have liked to have had more money but I also prefer to travel cheap than not travel at all.

You say “Some people might love this kind of lifestyle but i think why go to Thailand to live like a tramp?” – I say, we all have our own travel preferences and just because you wouldn’t enjoy travelling like this it doesn’t mean the figures aren’t accurate. It just means they’re not accurate for the kind of travel you choose to do.

Thanks for the great info My Funky Travel!

Nick Cardoso

This is fantastic, I wish it came up in my earlier searches, thanks for your effort!